Infantino presses re-election campaign amid World Cup sell-off fallout

Gianni Infantino is actively lobbying for re-election after Fifa abandoned its World Cup sell-off plan last month, meeting leaders at the United Nations general assembly in New York this week and continuing a global travel programme tied to his campaign. He has crisscrossed the world on a private jet provided by Qatar Airways and visited Doha, Rabat, Miami, Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Kyrgyzstan while his would-be opponents remain publicly silent.

Infantino’s trips have often coincided with the approval of funding for development projects worth millions of dollars, and dozens of the 200 member associations that had submitted letters of endorsement withdrew them after the emergence of his Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE) sale plan in July. Despite those withdrawals, multiple sources told the Guardian that a silent majority of member associations remain steadfastly behind him. Infantino first declared his intention to seek a fourth and final term at the April congress in Vancouver; a recent change to Fifa statutes allows a fourth term because his first term lasted three years following his 2016 election to replace Sepp Blatter.

Potential challengers have been largely absent from the field, a reality attributed by sources to a powerful incumbency advantage within Fifa. “As long as Gianni is running, I don’t think anyone else will raise their hand,” one source said. “They would effectively be running against Fifa the institution. Fifa declared his candidacy, provides staff, aeroplanes and cars, even a personal video team. If he doesn’t step down before March, the election will not be contested. Uefa and others could stage a boycott so the victory would be tainted, but Gianni will win a clear majority of whoever shows up.”

There are practical barriers to mounting a credible campaign against Infantino. Concacaf president Victor Montagliani is regarded as the most credible challenger but is committed to standing for re-election at his confederation in February and is not expected to run both contests. The AFC president Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa was Infantino’s opponent in 2016 and is disadvantaged by the fact that his confederation’s main powers—Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates—are backing Infantino. The position of Qatar was said to rule out a challenge from Nasser al-Khelaifi, while Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin has his own presidential contest in March to focus on; the last Fifa president defeated at a ballot was Sir Stanley Rous in 1974.

Uefa has pursued legal routes to try to remove Infantino, lodging a 56-page document alleging “criminal mismanagement” and seeking disclosure of documents relating to FFE in US state courts in New York, Miami and Colorado last month. Fifa filed a response in New York seeking to block the discovery process, stating: “Uefa’s application suffers from a fundamental defect: Uefa seeks discovery in aid of a foreign criminal proceeding that does not exist and that Uefa admittedly lacks the authority to initiate. While these applications are styled as legal pleadings with captions and docket numbers, they are little more than press releases in further support of Uefa’s smear campaign against Fifa and its leadership.” An initial decision from the courts is expected next month, at least one jurisdiction is widely expected to grant discovery, and both sides are likely to appeal, which sources said could delay the release of new material beyond the deadline for presidential candidates to come forward on 18 November.

Questions about the valuation and structure of FFE have been central to the dispute. Uefa’s not-so-secret hope is that discovery will show FFE was undervalued at $20bn to benefit Thrive Capital, which had seemingly agreed to pay $4.2bn for 21% of the new commercial venture. Thrive subsequently bought 20% of the LA Lakers last month as part of a larger transaction with the former Disney chief executive Bob Iger that valued the NBA franchise at $12.5bn. A senior investment banker said: “I don’t think Thrive was going to be involved with Fifa for the next 25 years. This looks like a quick in-and-out play. The plan would have been to buy it low and sell it high. I think the investors saw an amazing deal.” Fifa’s revenues for the four years to 2026 were $15bn, a figure projected to grow to $18bn over the next four-year cycle.

Legal experts and confederations have also criticised the lack of publicly disclosed detail about FFE. A sales deck produced by the US bank JP Morgan contained no details of a tender process, voting rights or future exit terms, and a corporate fraud lawyer said: “If you’re doing a deal that is way off market then you are deceiving the stakeholders, in this case the member associations. That is criminal. If Uefa has a criminal case that’s where it will be. It’s about how the valuation was done, by whom, and what conflicts were there. All of that should come out during disclosure. If beyond that there were personal deals being struck on the side, that could also be criminal. All those details should be disclosed.” There is, the article said, currently no evidence of wrongdoing by any parties involved in the proposed deal.

Uefa and Concacaf are also coordinating politically, working together to develop a unified Nations League and writing a joint letter last week to Fifa demanding that it release funds from its $6bn reserves to fund an additional payment of at least $10m to each of its 211 member associations during the next four-year cycle. Uefa and Concacaf are concerned that Infantino could receive political credit if he provides $20m more to member associations via FFE. Ceferin and Montagliani are expected to meet at next week’s general assembly of the European Football Clubs (EFC) in Copenhagen, where Infantino may also appear; Infantino addressed the EFC’s 900 members at last year’s meeting in Rome. Uefa withdrew its threat to boycott the Under-20 Women’s World Cup, which finishes on Sunday, and Infantino has agreed to commission an external governance review, a move he communicated in a letter to member associations this week.

For those campaigning to remove Infantino, legal processes and political manoeuvres are likely to continue alongside any election contest. “This is a fight to the death now and we have to keep going,” one source said. The presidential ballot at the Fifa congress is due to be held in March, and campaigners point to the example of Sepp Blatter—who resigned in 2015 days after winning a fifth term amid an FBI corruption investigation—to argue that an election result would not necessarily end the dispute.